That first Thursday and Friday remain two of the great days on the American sports calendar: noon-to-midnight hoops, four games on screen at a time, buzzer-beaters detonating out of nowhere and a campus or small college town you've never heard of suddenly becoming the center of the basketball universe.
Now that football takes a break from its weekly competition, those irrationally obsessed with the sadistic ground acquisition game can turn their attention spans toward the objectively beautiful, balletic, organic, improvisational and creative game of basketball -- just as it heads toward the meat of conference play and into the NCAA tournament. To the truly evolved, the preference for athletes who play both offense and defense continuously -- without breaks or committee meetings between plays -- is clear and unmistakable.